40 Celebrity Tattoos and Exactly What They Mean
There's always a story when it comes to ink.
Tattoos are a big part of today's culture, and stars are not exempt. From hidden script to highly visible art, take a peek at some of Hollywood's ink—and what it all means.
Kylie Jenner and Travis Scott
Kylie Jenner and Travis Scott took to Snapchat to showcase a major relationship milestone: matching tattoos. According to Us Weekly, the butterfly tattoo could possibly be linked to Scott's single, "Butterfly Effect," which many believe is about Kylie. We can safely say (in the words of Scott) that this is proof that their relationship is, "heatin' up."
Ariana Grande
According to the Sun, Grande and members of her Dangerous Woman tour were tattooed with bees backstage at the Manchester One Love show Sunday. A symbol of the city's industrial heritage, the insect refers to Manchester's textile mills in the 1800s, described as "hives of activity." Citizens have been lining up for bee tattoos after the May 22 bombing.
Miley Cyrus
Miley Cyrus got a new tattoo this week at the Shamrock Social Club in Los Angeles. Tattoo artist Dr. Woo shared a picture of the ink, a portrait of her Shetland sheepdog, Emu, on Instagram. "Placed a young Emu on his mom @mileycyrus," he captioned the picture.
Demi Lovato
After attending the Time 100 gala Tuesday, she had a massive lion's head inked onto her left hand. Maybe it was a tribute to the essay Ariana Huffington wrote, in which she praised Lovato's "courage, honesty, and willingness to use her own experiences to help others?" Hmm.
Justin Bieber
With backlit armpit hair and all, the Biebs introduced the world to his new bear chest tat and the huge eagle on his abdomen via Instagram story.
Miley Cyrus
Miley Cyrus's latest tattoo is a tribute to her dad, Billy Ray Cyrus. He loves the ink and posted it with pride on Twitter.
Lady Gaga
Lady Gaga kicked off Grammy night by getting a giant tattoo of a moth with a skull for a face. The caption? "The Moth & Metallica." (Note: she's playing with Metallica, so this makes total sense. Sort of.)
Zayn Malik
He might have gone to the same artist as her sister Bella, but Malik's new tattoo, a cursive "Love" across his right hand, can only be a testament to Gigi Hadid.
Kesha
"Psychedelic whales are slowly covering my entire body...," the singer captioned a photo of her new ink. She's already got a friendly narwhal tattoo, so it's only a matter of time before her menagerie of sea creatures expands again.
Sofia Richie
Another celebrity jumps on the small-script bandwagon, this time three in one go: "L" on her ankle for her father Lionel, "MBR" on her finger for her brother Miles Brockman Richie, and "Clarity" on her neck.
Kylie Jenner
Kylie Jenner shows us that she and Tyga are still going strong after recently debuting a small tattoo with the letter "t" on her ankle.
Lady Gaga
In celebration of the 10-year anniversary of the creative team who helped create Lady Gaga's avant-garde style, Haus of Gaga, Mother Monster took to Snapchat to reveal a new tattoo. Dedicated to the special group of artists, the tattoo reads "Haus" on the back of her arm. This makes it the 20th tattoo that Gaga has added to her collection.
Halsey
Singer Halsey broke down the meanings of all of her many ink etchings to iHeart Radio, where she explained that she chose the upside down horseshoe on her right arm despite the fact that's it's supposedly bad luck. "I got an upside down horseshoe to signify that I don't need luck. I work really, really hard, and I believe in the stars aligning, but I don't believe that anything happens to anyone based out of sheer luck. I believe people work really hard, and they manifest what they want, and what they need, and what they're hopeful for, and that's what this is—a reminder."
Evan Rachel Wood
Carey Mulligan
Carey Mulligan told Vulture that she believes the teeny tattoo of the seagull on her wrist helped her nab a role in the Steve McQueen flick Shame. During the audition process, she mentioned that she was mulling over the idea of a seagull tattoo as a reminder of the character Nina, who she played in a stage performance of The Seagull.
She told him, "There's this brilliant thing Nina says in Act Four when she comes back and she's completely f*cked up—she's had a child with this writer and she's lost the baby and she's lived in abject poverty, and she comes back and she's fraught but she's got this clarity." McQueen was a big fan of the idea, and she ended up getting both the tattoo and the role.
Lily Collins
Lily Collins is all about the ethereal for her tattoo designs (she has a tattoo of a moonlit fairy under her left breast and an elegant back tattoo that reads "Love Always and Forever"), and the one on her foot is no exception. She told the Daily Mail UK, "The one on my foot is a rose with the words, 'The nature of this flower is to bloom.' There's a single petal falling off to symbolize that I may look delicate, but I'm as strong as a rose," she says. "I had it done after I finished shooting my film, Love, Rosie."
Kelly Osbourne
In the wake of the Orlando nightclub shooting, longtime LGBT supporter Kelly Osbourne got the word "Solidarity" inked on the side of her head (ouch) in solidarity with the LGBT community and all those who lost their lives that day. On Instagram she wrote, "Solidarity: 'Noun. Unity of feeling of individuals with a common interest or purpose.' Individually, we have rights and unique gifts. Together, we have strength and powerful harmony. I have wanted to get this tattoo for a long time. The tragedy in Orlando devastated me and reminded me that every moment of our lives is precious..."
This isn't exactly the only scalp tattoo she's gotten either, as Osbourne has the word "Stories" etched on the other side of her head to match.
Lady Gaga
The ink-friendly singer commemorated her epic collaboration with Tony Bennett with a beautiful black-and-white trumpet on the inside of her left bicep (designed by Bennett himself!).
Lady Gaga
And yet another, an etching of one of her idols David Bowie (you saw her full-on Grammy's tribute to Bowie, right?) on her left rib is a tribute to the Thin White Duke in his Ziggy Stardust days.
Megan Fox
The Transformers star has been inked and de-inked a couple times before (she got rid of her Marilyn Monroe tattoo to avoid "attracting negative energy") but the most prominent is the script on her back that adapts a line from Shakespeare's King Lear. It reads, "We will all laugh at gilded butterflies" and she has been quoted saying that it's a reminder "to not get too caught up in Hollywood because people will end up laughing at you."
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